


Superstition

by ginger-ai (mesutwoahzil)



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: M/M, because math is the best, finn agrees with me, finn and poe are shy nerds in love, fluffy indulgent mush, i love them, i saw a fanart of finn in a school uniform and thought MATHLETE, poe is a Secret Geek, poe wants to be smooth but is Not Smooth, they are both flustered dorks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-13
Updated: 2016-08-13
Packaged: 2018-08-08 11:50:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7756807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mesutwoahzil/pseuds/ginger-ai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finn is a junior mathlete stressed about his upcoming competition and Poe is the mysterious senior with a nerdy secret of his own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Superstition

**Author's Note:**

> this is bit of short, self-indulgent fluff. I love math and I love love stories so why not have a cute math-related love story. (although there isn't a lot of love in this just the BEGINNINGS of love.) (spoiler alert. i guess.)
> 
> also WARNING this is probably FULL of typos. I hate editing so I elected not to do it lmao. Apologies in advance.

“Are you sure you’re not coming tonight?”

Finn’s roommate, a sturdy boy who goes by the name of Nines (to be honest, Finn’s not sure what his real name even is. He’d arrived before Finn and taken his name placard off the wall, replacing it with his nickname written in crude sharpie on a piece of notebook paper) is standing by the door, head cocked to one side like maybe if he looks cool enough, Finn will cave and decide to accompany him. 

“No man it’s okay. I’ve been stressed lately what with the Olympiad coming up and everything. I’m just looking to relax tonight.”

Nines quirks an eyebrow and glances down at the notebook in Finn’s hands. “By doing more math?”

“What? I think it’s relaxing.”

Nines levels a long stare at Finn. “ _Okay dude, whatever you say._ ” He waves his hands dramatically for emphasis. “ _Sure_ , I mean, it’s just the biggest senior party of the year that _yours truly_ managed to get his junior roommate an invite to. _No big deal_.” When Finn doesn’t take the bait, Nines shrugs one last time. “Fine then. More booze fore me.” He turns on his heel and steps out. “Have fun with you relaxing math’” he uses air-quotes here, “whatever that means.” 

The door shuts.

The rough part is Finn’s not even lying. Math _is_ relaxing, at a certain level. He’s comfortable with numbers, and the rules that they follow. They’re predictable, certain. Add two numbers and you’ll always get the same thing. An equation is an equation is an equation. 

Simple stuff. Completely different than how the real world has been looking as of late. Truth be told the Olympiad isn’t even what’s got him stressed out. He’s good at math, the best in the school, possibly even the state if he wins. But that hasn’t stopped Jessika from dropping out last minute due to the flu, Kare mixing up the permission forms and Mr. Antilles forgetting to submit a transportation request one month prior as is required. Now they have to find their own rides to the Olympiad and Finn is shit out of luck. Out of his group of friends only two have drivers licenses: Jessika, who isn’t an option because of aforementioned flu, and Iolo, who owns a shitty two-seater and already promised to take Kare.

He sighs and presses a hand to his temple, trying and failing to focus on the numbers in front of him. When that doesn’t work he shuts his notebook and throws himself onto his bed, switching off the light as he goes.

He tries his best not to fall asleep with a frown on his face. After half an hour of tossing and turning, he finally succumbs, and falls into a fitful rest.

\--

Finn wakes up to the click of the lock opening and the sound of feet shuffling across the carpet towards Nines’ side of the room. It’s still dark outside.

Between steps a low voice murmurs quietly, soft enough that Finn can’t quite make out what Nines is muttering about.

Well. At least he knows Nines made it back oka—

Wait. 

That’s not Nines’ voice. 

Finn whips his head around peeps up from under the covers, cracking his eyes open. He’s half blinded by the sliver of light coming in from the hallway through the cracked door, but he can just make out not one, but _two_ shapes standing over Nines’ bed, one leaning heavily on the other. 

His body prepares to leap out of bed and make a run for it, but after a few seconds of stupefied blinking his eyes adjust and his heartrate slows somewhat. Its not two murderers come to silence him forever. Instead, its Nines and one of the senior boys Finn has seen around. Nines has his arm slung over the boy’s shoulder as he sways forward dangerously. 

Before Nines can slither to the ground, the boy holding him up eases him down onto the bed and kneels to help remove his shoes. 

At this moment Finn decides to sit up, concern for his roommate overcoming his fear of the situation.

“Uhh…”

“ _Fuck!_ ” The boy kneeling on the ground whips around, right hand pressed to his chest and eyes wide. Even in the near-darkness Finn can make out attractive features. A strong jaw, wide eyes and curly brown hair. “You scared me dude!”

Finn reaches over to turn his desk lamp on, ignoring Nines’ pained groan when the room floods with light. A quick glance at the alarm clock says its close to 4 am. 

“Is he okay?” He motions to where Nines is sitting, face now pressed into his palms. The boy finishes tugging off Nines’ shoes and stands, helping ease Nines down onto the mattress before pulling his blanket over him. 

“Yeah he’ll be okay, I think. Too much to drink.”

Finn nods absentmindedly, mind whirring over what to do. 

“Hey, do you mind if I hang around a bit and look after him? I heard you shouldn’t leave a drunk person unattended. They might choke or something.”

Finn feels his eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. Leave it to Nines to get this wasted and land him with a complete stranger until he gets better. 

The boy swallows once and looks between them, stuffing his hands in his varsity jacket pockets. 

“Plus—I mean---you could go back to bed, If you want. I’d hate to ruin your night’s sleep all because this knucklehead couldn’t hold his liquor.”

Finn finally tears his eyes away from Nines’ prone form and looks up at the boy. “Um. No thanks.” He swings his legs over the side of the bed. “I’d rather not sleep with a stranger in the room to be honest.”

The boy nods, brows drawing together and lips pursing. “That’s fair.”

Finn pads across the room to snag his water bottle from his backpack, taking a deep swig and returning to his bed. This time he crawls on top of the covers, snatching his notebook off his desk and flipping open to the last unfinished problem. 

A few minutes pass by in silence. 

“Listen. Uh.” Finn flicks his eyes upwards and catches the stranger with one hand on the back of his neck and his eyes trained resolutely on the far wall. “I’m sorry about all this, really. I didn’t want to leave him there and I happened to have enough space in my car so I thought I’d give him a lift back and maybe he’d be sober by the time we reached campus but you know…obviously that didn’t happen and—“

“Hey no. It’s cool.” Against his better judgment Finn finds his lips quirking up into a half-smile. He’s still a bit wary, as anyone would be with a stranger in their room, but he’s seen this boy around before, laughing with some of the other seniors. Plus he’d taken it upon himself to make sure Nines got home safely. “I’m Finn, by the way.” 

The boy’s eyes light up a bit, twinkling in the glare of the desk lamp. “Poe. Poe Dameron.” 

“Nice to meet you.”

Poe meets Finn’s tentative smile with a grin and nods down at the notebook in Finn’s lap. “Math homework?”

Finn bites the inside of his cheek. “Not exactly. Just. Uh…math.”

From the looks of him its not possible, but Poe’s face somehow lights up even more. “You, like, a mathlete or something?”

Finn looks away then, afraid that somewhere under the friendly smile Poe is laughing at him. “Something like that,” he grumbles. 

“That’s cool!” Finn’s eyes snap back to Poe who has his palms up and open. “One of the kids in my grade—Iolo—said he was into that too. Said there was a big competition coming up? Or something? Him and a few juniors were planning on going?”

Finn tries not to pout when Poe brings up the source of his anxiety.

Apparently he fails, because Poe’s eyebrow quirks. “Is there a competition? It stressing you out or something?”

With a whooshing sigh Finn gives up on his math and tosses his notebook to one side. “You could say that. It’s not the competition that’s worrying me though. It’s everything else. Like how the hell I’m gonna get there and get back and—“

“They didn’t reserve a bus for it?”

“Well Mr. Antilles was _supposed_ but he didn’t submit the request in time so I’m technically stranded.”

“No friends can take you?”

Finn throws his hands up in a gesture of defeat. 

After a beat of silence Poe lifts a hand and scratches the back of his head, eyes suddenly straying towards the window. 

“Well…I mean if there’s really no other way, I could take you. I have a car.” 

Finn feels his eyes go wide, jaw dropping. “Wait. Really?”

“Yeah. Uh, how do you think I got Nines here—“

“No—I mean—you’d really do that?” His voice may or may not crack a little. 

“Sure thing, man. I know it might be a little creepy coming from a guy you just met. If you’d feel better Nines could tag along, or one of the other seniors. You know, as a gesture of good faith.” 

Finn shakes his head to make sure he’s not dreaming. Did some handsome stranger really just stroll into his room with his drunk roommate and offer to solve all his problems? 

“No it’s—Nines wouldn’t go for that anyway. I can handle myself just fine. But the Olympiad’s at the eastern convention center, almost an hour from here. You sure you want to drive all that way?”

“Hey it’s no biggie. I love the open road. Plus it’s the least I can do.” Poe gestures to the boy passed out and snoring behind him. “What with this whole….situation.”

Finn mulls his words over for a second, weighing his options. Either he takes Poe up on his offer or he calls a cab and blows half his spending money for a two way trip. Or he makes new friends who have cars. He snorts. 

“Okay, Poe. If it’s cool with you, it would really help me out a ton.” Finn feels his face heat up as Poe’s mouth stretches into an easy smile. 

“Hey don’t mention it.” 

They continue chatting for a few minutes until finally Nines cracks an eye open and asks what’s going on. He appears more lucid now, less likely to accidentally hurt himself and Poe takes that as his cue to leave. Before he goes, he and Finn exchange numbers. 

Finn resolutely does not think about the way Poe smiles at him before he leaves. 

Or the way he smells like earth and engine oil. 

Nope. Not at al. 

\------

 

 

When the day of the competition comes, Finn finds himself surprisingly relaxed. Without the extra worry of how he was going to get there he had time to buckle down and finish preparing, solidifying topics from his current level and revisiting a few from freshman and sophomore year. 

When he’d woken up the day of, he’d felt better rested than he had in months. 

Finn takes another swig of water out of his water bottle before slipping it back into the side pocket of his backpack. He’s seated on a bench outside the main portico, eyes trained on the main boulevard that marks the school’s entrance. 

Poe had texted him twice since the night he’d helped Nines back into the room in the middle of the night. Nothing spectacular, just one message saying when he’d pick Finn up and what his car looked like and another wishing him luck on his preparations. 

That didn’t stop Finn from staring at them for longer than necessary with a strange feeling fluttering in his stomach. 

Nope. 

A few minutes pass and Finn picks up what sounds suspiciously like eighties pop blaring in the distance. He lifts his eyes from his backpack and spots a black Camaro with orange detailing rolling down the boulevard towards him. As the car pulls up along the sidewalk in front of him, the music dims and the window lowers, revealing Poe, face alight with a smile at the sight of Finn in his school uniform on a Saturday. 

“Hey there, stranger!”

Finn snorts and picks his backpack up off the ground, hoisting it over his shoulder. Checking to make sure he hasn’t left anything on the bench beside him, he makes his way over and pops open the passenger door, settling in among the various bits and bobs Poe has strewn about the front, including a McDonald’s bag full of old receipts and what appears to be some kind of mix-tape collection. 

“I seriously can’t thank you enough for this. You’ve saved my life.”

Poe laughs and rolls the side window back up once Finn has closed the door, putting the car in drive and pulling away from the curb. 

“I take it math is your life?”

Finn looks down at his hands in his lap. “Something like that.” 

When he glances back up, Poe’s eyes are on him instead of the road. His expression is inscrutable, but if Finn had to guess, it looks almost…..soft?. When Poe notices Finn’s gaze he snaps his eyes back on the road, flushing. 

“That’s uh. That’s cool dude. I’m sure you’ll do great today then.” 

Finn tries not to grin too broadly at that. He doesn’t want to jinx it, after all. 

\--

They drive in comfortable silence for almost half an hour, letting the sound of the highway and muted eighties synth beats fill the space between them. At a red light, Finn catches Poe staring in his direction instead of the road again. They keep eye-contact for a little longer this time until both of them break away to stare in opposite directions. 

Poe coughs nervously as the light turns green and he puts his foot back on the gas. 

This time around the silence is decidedly less comfortable. Finn’s eyes wander the vehicle, taking in the clutter strewn about the dashboard and center console until his eyes catch on a wire resting in the cup holder that leads to the back seat. He follows it until his eyes land on a cardboard box in the back, filled with what looks to be plastic pieces spray-painted in white and orange, a half-finished dolly with 3 wheels and a large gyro attached, wiring and computer chips. 

“What’s that?”

Poe quickly glances away from the road to see what Finn is referring to and then breaks out into a wide grin that stretches the sides of his face. 

“Ah that? That’s BB-8 dude!” 

Finn tears his eyes away from the box to give Poe a questioning stare. 

“He’s our entry to a competition next semester. Nothing huge but I’m getting a head start on him because I could.”

“Robotics?” Finn tries not to let his surprise show. He never saw Poe hanging out with any of the kids he thought would be into that kind of stuff. He was usually hanging out with kids like Nines and his friends, none of whom gave math or science a second glance. 

“Yeah? I mean…I’m no Tony Stark. But it’s a lot more fun than sitting around and watching TV.” 

“That’s cool.” Finn hopes he sounds genuine. The fact that Poe is into robotics, can probably understand the kind of devotion Finn has with his own nerdy hobby, makes Finn’s heart flutter. No wonder Poe hadn’t judged him when he told him about the Olympiad.

\--

Twenty minutes pass and Finn can see the convention center looming in the distance. The telltale curl of anxiety bubbles up in his stomach but he forces it down, reminding himself how hard he’s studied and how well he’s done on all of the practice rounds. 

He’s got this. 

At another red light Poe glances over and must see the look on Finn’s face. 

“Hey.” 

Finn glances up and finds that strange soft look again. 

“Not to sound creepy or anything but I told Iolo I was driving you here and he said you’re the best in the school.” 

Finn barks out a laugh. 

“You know its true!” Poe laughs too. “All I’m saying you’ll do absolutely fine. And you don’t even need me to tell you that. That’s how in the bag this is.” 

Finn laughs again and tries not to look flustered at the look on Poe’s face.

The light turns green and the car lurches forward. They’re almost there. As Poe turns the last corner onto the main street that runs alongside the building he slows and parks. 

“Hey.”

Finn stops from where he’s started to hoist is backpack into his lap and turns to look at Poe again. 

“Are you superstitious?”

“What?”

“Superstitious.” Poe’s eyebrow wiggles suggestively. “Are you?”

“Not particularly, no.” 

Poe’s shoulders slump a little at that. “Well, I was gonna say you could take my lucky jacket.” He reaches into the back and pulls out a beat up brown leather jacket from the floor behind Finn’s seat. From what he can tell it looks well-loved, perhaps even a bit ragged. “I have never lost a competition with this baby. But I mean. If that’s weird then obviously you don’t have to take it. I just though it might make you feel a bit better. If that’s not your thing then maybe—“

“I’ll take it.” 

Poe’s eyes lift from the jacket he’s cradling to Finn’s face. His eyebrows are raised and his mouth hangs a little open. 

For a moment Finn considers changing his mind, letting the strange boy who helped his roommate back into their room at 4 am and tends to ramble keep his strange jacket, letting him drive away and then pick him up in 4 hours where they will repeat the same ride and say little to each other, parting as new acquaintances and nothing more.

But as flustered as he is about Poe, Finn is nothing if not courageous. He reaches out and grasps the jacket, lifting it out of Poe’s hands and into his own. 

“I don’t need the good luck, but I’ll take it.” 

Poe seems to take a few moments to process this and then his eyes almost shut with the force of his grin. “Well it won’t hurt you ether way.” 

“No I guess not. Thanks, Poe.” Finn returns Poe’s smile and presses the jacket to his chest. After a beat he decides he really needs to head inside and meet up with the others if they’re gonna have time to fit a bit of practice in after registration. He pops open the passenger door and puts one foot on the sidewalk. 

“Wait!” 

Finn nearly hits his head on the ceiling as he whips his head back around at Poe’s outburst. 

“I uh. Well. I was wondering if maybe, after you're finished, instead of driving straight back we could maybe go somewhere? To eat?”

Finn blinks. 

“Anywhere you wanna go. My treat. As a way of saying congrats? You don't have to go obviously. No pressure. I just uh. Thought it would be....nice."

Finn’s heart lurches in his chest suddenly and he has to take a few breathes to reign it back in. Across from him Poe seems to be in the same boat, face red and voice breathy with nerves. The air between them seems to be climbing in temperature. 

As the silence threatens to stretch into uncomfortable territory, Finn feels something bubble in his chest. It grows with intensity, filling with him with a strange mix of joy and amusement until finally he’s laughing through a wide grin. He looks down at his lap again before glancing back at Poe, whose face has gone soft again, eyes filled with a mix of awe and uncertainty. 

“I'd like that." He leaves out the _a lot_ but he's pretty sure Poe picks up on it anyway. Poe’s face fills with delight at his words and Finn can see the way he tightens his grip on his thighs in an effort to contain himself. 

From somewhere outside the car, Iolo’s voice appears suddenly. “Finn! There you are! Come on man we gotta go register what are you doing?”

“Be right there!” Finn calls back, pushing the door open all the way and starting to get out. 

Before he starts towards where Iolo and Kare are standing he turns back to Poe, gazing at him with mirth in his eyes. 

“Thanks for the ride again. I’ll see you in a few hours. For dinner?”

Poe nods, putting his hands back on the steering wheel. “Yeah.” He sounds breathless. “For dinner.”

They gaze at each other warmly for a few seconds until Iolo’s exasperated voice tears Finn away. If there’s a skip in his step all the way to registration, Iolo and Kare don’t comment on it, only letting a sly knowing look pass between them when they think Finn isn't looking.

(Unfortunately, Finn isn't allowed to wear the jacket during the competition, as he must maintain regulation uniform. Instead he keeps it tucked under his backpack by his chair.)

(Fortunately, he still wins first place, just like he knew he would.)


End file.
